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Sweden's Cash-Free Future Looms -- and Not Everyone Is Happy About It
HughPickens.com writes: Liz Alderman writes in the NYT that bills and coins now represent just 2 percent of Sweden's economy, compared with 7.7 percent in the United States and 10 percent in the euro area and this year only about 20 percent of all consumer payments in Sweden have been made in cash, compared with an average of 75 percent in the rest of the world. "Sweden has always been at the forefront of technology, so it's easy to embrace this," said Jacob de Geer, a founder of iZettle, which makes a mobile-powered card reader. In Sweden parishioners text tithes to their churches, homeless street vendors carry mobile credit-card readers, and even the Abba Museum, despite being a shrine to the 1970s pop group that wrote "Money, Money, Money," considers cash so last-century that it does not accept bills and coins. "We don't want to be behind the times by taking cash while cash is dying out," says Bjorn Ulvaeus, a former Abba member who has leveraged the band's legacy into a sprawling business empire, including the museum.
But not everyone is pleased with the process. Remember, Sweden is the place where, if you use too much cash, banks call the police because they think you might be a terrorist or a criminal. Swedish banks have started removing cash ATMs from rural areas, annoying old people and farmers. Credit Suisse says the rule of thumb in Scandinavia is: "If you have to pay in cash, something is wrong." Sweden's embrace of electronic payments has alarmed consumer organizations and critics who warn of a rising threat to privacy and increased vulnerability to sophisticated Internet crimes. Last year, the number of electronic fraud cases surged to 140,000, more than double the amount a decade ago, according to Sweden's Ministry of Justice. Older adults and refugees in Sweden who use cash may be marginalized, critics say, and young people who use apps to pay for everything or take out loans via their mobile phones risk falling into debt. "It might be trendy," says Bjorn Eriksson, a former director of the Swedish police force and former president of Interpol. "But there are all sorts of risks when a society starts to go cashless."
But not everyone is pleased with the process. Remember, Sweden is the place where, if you use too much cash, banks call the police because they think you might be a terrorist or a criminal. Swedish banks have started removing cash ATMs from rural areas, annoying old people and farmers. Credit Suisse says the rule of thumb in Scandinavia is: "If you have to pay in cash, something is wrong." Sweden's embrace of electronic payments has alarmed consumer organizations and critics who warn of a rising threat to privacy and increased vulnerability to sophisticated Internet crimes. Last year, the number of electronic fraud cases surged to 140,000, more than double the amount a decade ago, according to Sweden's Ministry of Justice. Older adults and refugees in Sweden who use cash may be marginalized, critics say, and young people who use apps to pay for everything or take out loans via their mobile phones risk falling into debt. "It might be trendy," says Bjorn Eriksson, a former director of the Swedish police force and former president of Interpol. "But there are all sorts of risks when a society starts to go cashless."
I thought all countries (in the developed world, at the very least) had laws stating in one wording or another that it is illegal for a business to refuse payment in the country's official currency?
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There are kids around here who think nothing of hauling out a Plastic Card to buy a 50 cent Candy bar.
Typically, a Cashless Society has a lot of hidden overhead, and those who promote the concept the most tend to benefit from that overhead.
It's not a Conspiracy Against Freedom, it's the Triumph Of the Hidden Middlemen.
A cash-free society means the banks, and any business or government or person with juice, knows what everyone is doing. If you have no problem with this, build your next house with glass walls, and put a streaming camera and mic on your person.
All this, contrast to corporations and governments. Corporations aren't people, so you can't really spy on those. Corporations are now freeer, and now don't even have to declare a nationality. Their banking is private, if they desire. Derivative markets are untrackable and untaxed. They don't pay taxes. Yet they demand we give it all up to them, because ???? we're idiots.
Governments? The US, UK, Australia and NZ are frothing at the mouth to destroy any whistleblowers who rat them out. Assange is STILL in jail, no charges other than trying to get away from retribution. Wikileaks supporters have problems flying in airplanes and crossing borders. And the governments have no problem spying on everyone else and demanding that right. And the Cayman Islands secret banking system is left alone, because the CIA, the mob, and corporations like their privacy.
Aren't 'marginalizes old people and refugees' and 'makes racking up consumer debt ever easier' typically considered features, rather than bugs, in payment systems?
Here comes the barter economy. Already starting to take off.
Sadly, there are some pretty severe limitations in a barter economy. For small, local stuff it can be made to function, but anything larger and it simply becomes unworkable. It just doesn't scale well.
Just cruising through this digital world at 33 1/3 rpm...
They get a slice of the transaction when you pay via plastic (the trader pays 1-3%). They get a bit when you pay in cash since the retailer will have to pay the bank a bit (cash handling charge) when they pay in at the end of the day. However bankers get nothing on many payments: the man who mows the lawn, the baby sitter, the window cleaner, ... many of these will spend what they earn as cash - so several transactions that the banks do not get the chance to bacon slice.
OK: this might not be a large part of the economy, but all those free transactions must be annoying them!
This was an *extremely* annoying aspect of visiting the ABBA museum in Stockholm: they refuse to accept cash at all. Neither for admission nor for the gift shop. At least in 2013 when I was there, signs were posted with an explanation by Bjorn who mentioned his son's apartment being robbed and how the burglars made away with some cash. So... "ban all cash" because my kid left some in his apartment and it got burgled. For an otherwise smart and talented guy, this has to be one of the most fatuous rationales ever.
Anybody want a peanut?
You people are just such shallow thinkers, tracking is not the problem, the real problem is making you a non-person, you can not buy anything, you can not enter anywhere, you can not ride anything, you cease to be a digital human being and they don't even need to lock you up. Just kill you like an animal when you finally lose it after being hounded and harassed 24/7 and blame you for it. They can not only hold you digitally hostage but your entire family. Extreme digital extortion, obey or be digitally destroyed. The true difference between freedom and slavery, either you need to continually ask permission to do anything or you can maturely decide for yourself. Every time you spend money with a card, you are not spending what you own, you are asking permission to buy something, think about that!!!
Chaos - everything, everywhere, everywhen